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Behind the scenes at CBC’s new National: Four hosts, one big risk

Inside the frosty fourth-floor Toronto studios of the newly revamped The National, hosts Ian Hanomansing and Adrienne Arsenault say they have absolutely no clue.

“Actually, no one’s even contemplated who’s going to kick off the first show,” says Hanomansing, sitting at the Lucite-and-steel desk that will debut when the CBC’s flagship news show airs Monday at 10 p.m. with a historic four hosts.

They include Rosemary Barton, 41, in Ottawa; Andrew Chang, 33, in Vancouver; and Arsenault, 50, and Hanomansing, 55, in Toronto.

“I have to be honest, I don’t care,” says Arsenault, looking over at her co-anchor.

“We haven’t talked about it. But that tells you a lot. There is no question in my mind that other shows would have figured this out long in advance,” says Hanomansing. “But that has not been the issue.”

“I think it will be dictated by the story,” says Arsenault, arriving at a decidedly Canadian solution. “The story should be the boss of us. It’s really not about us.”

Less than a week away from the premiere, the tiniest of details have yet to be worked out — but it’s clear there’s a lot at stake. Following the retirement of anchor Peter Mansbridge, it’s the first time in 29 years that The National will have new permanent hosts.

And no one, including the new hosts, knows for sure whether audiences will ever get used to the idea of four anchors, a new set and the absence of the guy with the reassuring baritone that was made for insomniacs.

Certainly the new studio looks visually stunning. There is that desk — Arsenault cautions me about putting my tape recorder in the middle since there is a hole in it, which is the cue for joking about CBC budget cuts — to the impressive and ever-changing video walls that surround the anchors.

There are also nods to the past. In one corner are former CBC anchor Knowlton Nash’s oversized, Clark Kent-style eyeglasses. Above that is an antique TV donated by Mansbridge.

The show’s logo has also been updated. It looks modern, but in a darker and more sombre typeface that gives a nod to print. It is all the news that’s fit to broadcast.

“We wanted to make the set a little more approachable, to break down the walls between the anchor and the viewer. But it’s really quite a simple design,” says Michael Gruzuk, senior director of content experience for the CBC and one of the managers spearheading the redesign.

Earlier, the four anchors had been rehearsing. It is a National newscast lineup that no viewer will ever see, including stories on the indictment of former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort and the ongoing problems with the controversial vote for secession in Catalonia.

The camera switches between Barton in Ottawa, Chang in Vancouver and the Toronto studio as the video walls change to reflect supporting visuals. But mostly there is a lot of waiting around. Chang takes swigs of coffee. Arsenault drums her fingers on the table. Barton checks her email.

Arsenault says that after she got over the “new car smell” of the rejigged set, she felt more at home than when she filled in for Mansbridge on the old set.

“It’s very warm. I’m surprised at how inviting it is,” she says. “I found the old National set to be very intimidating. It was like being in a temple, very serious. I think I was terrified 99 per cent of the time I did it.”

Despite Arsenault’s relentless self-deprecation, there is an Emmy Award in her closet — for her coverage of the Ebola epidemic in Liberia — that would look fine right beside Nash’s spectacles.

If anyone has a right to be disappointed that he didn’t get a solo gig, it is Hanomansing, the most senior of the anchors. (And, he jokes, the tallest of a short bunch of hosts). He has been a longtime substitute anchor on The National. A trained lawyer, he was also seen as the heir apparent to Mansbridge for many years, if only he would leave his beloved Vancouver.

“When I first sat here, it just started to get real,” he says. “One of my pet peeves with Canadian TV is how derivative it can be. Here we have something that has never been done like this before. That’s pretty cool if it works — and we think it will. This is a potential model that they’re building.”

Without question, this is the most technologically and logistically ambitious show produced by the public broadcaster. And also a gamble.

“It’s challenging. But we also have great flexibility,” says Jonathan Whitten, executive director of depth and context, who oversees The National.

Whitten says, crucially, the show will not necessarily feature four anchors daily.

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“It depends on the story,” he says. “That also allows the other hosts to be out in the field.”

Missing in action on this day is Steve Ladurantaye, the show’s former managing editor, felled by a controversy involving inappropriate tweets over cultural appropriation. Ladurantaye has been reassigned.

So far, a new managing editor hasn’t been hired and might not be any time soon.

“We’ve had executive producers before to do the show, but not a managing editor. It’s, in a way, the absence of something we’ve never had,” says Hanomansing.

Ladurantaye, a former Twitter executive, was supposed to add digital chops to a program that under Mansbridge was solid but not exactly dynamic. With an average nightly audience of 462,000 viewers over the current season, it has been handily beaten by competitors including Global National with Dawna Friesen at 733,000 and CTV’s National News with Lisa LaFlamme at 975,000. But the new National is now much more au courant, with a permanent anchor desk in Vancouver, meaning the program could have live hits until 2 a.m., while making it a step closer to being truly national.

Certainly, it seems like something of a grand experiment. Besides the now-familiar mantras of more social media and giving viewers a multimedia experience, the CBC has not taken the cookie-cutter route. Instead, it has taken four diverse journalists, each with very different but, it’s hoped, complementary skills, and paved a different path. The emphasis has been on journalists first, not news readers.

Hanomansing and Arsenault said they thought there would be three, not four, anchors when they first heard of the revamp.

“I think they did the math and they realized they needed to cover off the different nights and editions,” Hanomansing said, adding that after he was told he got the job he signed a nondisclosure agreement and then had to hire a lawyer to get it amended so he could tell his wife.

Arsenault was at a cottage talking to CBC News editor-in-chief Jennifer McGuire when she was offered the position.

“It was weird; the only place I could get any cellphone connectivity was in the middle of the lake. So I’m out paddling in the middle of the lake hearing this.”

Hanomansing says he asked management how many people were on the short list and was told there were 12.

“I think it speaks to the people at the CBC that very few networks in North America could have that many internal serious candidates that late in the process.”

But can all anchors truly be created equal?

Unlike their counterparts at Global or CTV, the CBC hosts have no official editorial responsibility. LaFlamme is not just a host but also the senior editor of CTV National News. Dawna Friesen, anchor of Global National, is also the executive editor. At the CBC that power is in the hands of off-air managers.

Mansbridge did hold one additional title. He was the CBC’s chief correspondent, a title that seems to be retired for now. And nobody seems to know who will get first dibs on plum assignments. But the diva in the bunch has yet to appear.

“Our jobs are just hosts. Officially we have no input into anything. But unofficially we do have a lot of input into the show,” says Hanomansing. “In terms of who gets what, I think it’s about playing to our skill set. I feel I can be a pretty good reporter, but Adrienne is a far better reporter. So if there’s any doubt and we’re both interested, my view is that Adrienne should get it.”

Undoubtedly, the competition is watching, determining whether this is the next big thing or just a big, taxpayer-funded train wreck.

“I think the industry is looking to see if this works,” says Arsenault. “And the better we are at what we do means that it pushes them to be better, too. And that goes the same for us. It’s important we get it right.”

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